Future Imaginings

ISOBEL CHURCH: Dystopias and magical utopias are blossoming in droves at the moment; it seems with the current climate of change, there’s no avoiding thoughts of the yawning future. Two current shows, After Nature at the New Museum in New York, and Supernatural at CCA Andratx, both delve into man’s changing relationship with nature and related future imaginings. Other past exhibitions, including Fusion Now! at the Rokeby Gallery and Brave New Worlds at the Walker Arts Centre also saw artists applying their practices to alternative visions of the future.

ISOBEL CHURCH: Dystopias and magical utopias are blossoming in droves at the moment; it seems with the current climate of change, there’s no avoiding thoughts of the yawning future. Two current shows, After Nature at the New Museum in New York, and Supernatural at CCA Andratx, both delve into man’s changing relationship with nature and related future imaginings. Other past exhibitions, including Fusion Now! at the Rokeby Gallery and Brave New Worlds at the Walker Arts Centre also saw artists applying their practices to alternative visions of the future.

Unravelling like a novel, the current After Nature at the New Museum is a group exhibition telling the tale of a future landscape of ruin and distorted wilderness. Inspired by Warner Herzog’s fictional documentaries, the often fantastical prophecies narrate the demise of a lost civilisation and undoing of humanity on the verge of the precipice. Supernatural at CCA Andratx sets out to challenge archaic idealistic visions of the landscape and its romanticised language, subverting our traditional view.

The exhibitions avoid more obvious apocalyptic warnings and grim statistics of green pessimism, revealing instead surreal alternative versions growing out of the present. Further rocking the boat and questioning doom-laden approaches was Fusion Now!, whose premise was a hypothetical unlimited supply of energy as a result of nuclear fusion, and the artists responded in kind. Artist duo WITH, for instance, created a satirical fake residency, intricately documenting an artist research trip in the Arctic which never occurred.

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